Wednesday, January 27, 2010

Here's another brand new collage sheet - "Close to You". These images are perfect for Valentine art and or any romantic-themed art. It will be available this weekend at Collage Stuff. This is not a free image for download.

Tuesday, January 26, 2010

I made it home safely from the CHA show. While I was away, a box of vintage greeting cards arrived. They were so lovely, that I sat down right away to make this new collage sheet - Vintage Birthday Cards. The background is vintage sheet music in a sepia tone. The colors are vivid and beautiful.

Monday, January 25, 2010

Today was the last of my CHA adventure. I had a class at 7am this morning by Simply Swank - soldering. I have tried to solder before and it hasn't been pretty. I think I did a little better this time!

Here's the class kit. We didn't keep the tools in the zip bag. We did keep the pink "purse". The "purse" contained many of our class supplies.

The large project is 2 x 3". It's bigger than you'd think. There are actually 4 panes of glass in this project. The background is the first layer. The wings and legs are the second layer. The girl's body with the crown and the words comprise the next layer and it's finished up with the 4th pane of glass. I had a hard time getting the jump ring soldered on this one. The bigger one was harder to solder. The little charm is about 1.25 x 1". We were given collage sheets with a lot of images, so we could choose the images and words we liked.

I went by the Sizzix booth to look at the Tim Holtz Alterations dies. They demonstrated the dies and they cut through matboard easily. They will easily cut grungeboard. I went to Product Performers next and took this photo. They carry all of the Tim Holtz products. I don't think I'll carry these dies as normal stock, but I can definitely order them in. It's not a problem to special order something I don't have in stock. I think I like the bird cage die the best.

Here's a close-up of one of the new Tim Holtz paper packs.

Here's the other two paper packs. If you can see the numerals to the middle right - they have been redesigned. The numerals now are only numbers and the price is something like $5.99 instead of $9.99.

I walked the show today looking for grungy embellishments. Everything is bling. I couldn't find a grungy anything. I went by the Axelrod booth and ordered these two filagree corners. I had these in stock a couple of years ago. I ordered them both in silver and gold. It is possible to distress these with black paint.

I ordered in these large bird brass charms. They will be around $1.99 each. This is most reasonably priced large bird charm like this that I've found.

I always have to go to Eyelet Outlet. I ordered in these brads. They look elegant.

These dove brads are new. I ordered these. I also re-ordered the tweeting bird brads.

I ordered these anodized heart brads. They come in a mix of two different sizes in gold, silver, copper and maybe one other color. I re-ordered the anodized loopy brads.

My last class was with Tattered Angels - Glimmer Mist 101. I've seen this stuff and wanted to learn more about it. Here's what we saw when we walked in to the class. We walked out with a stencil thing, 4 bottles of Glimmer Mist and a ring binder full of Glimmer Mist techniques that we did in the class.

Here's a photo of one of the techniques. It's nice as each page has the name of the technique. We could write notes on the backs of the pages.

For this page, we used a coordinating clear stamp and overlay thing. We stamped first. Then we put the matching overlay over the stamped image and finally sprayed the glimmer mist.

White I was walking around today searching for grungy embellishments, I went back by the Advantus booth and did the Tim Holtz make-n-take. The lines are always really long for the make-n-takes and I hate standing in line. I had to wait about 15 minutes to do this one. This is an ornate plate with a dictionary page inset. The little keyhole is one of the new keyholes and it is attached with mini fasteners. I like these new keyholes a lot better than the old style keyholes. The little key is in the same package with the keyholes. The bird charm is in the package of Tim Holtz charms. I don't know where the pearl drop and bling drop came from. We also tied on some little bits of white tulle.

I went back by the Ranger booth a couple of times. They had cool make-n-takes, but the lines were too long. The second time I went by, there was a huge crowd and I knew that it had to be for Tim Holtz. I was right. Tim was doing some demos and the people were lined up around 6-7 people deep. If I were 7 feet tall, I might have been able to see something.

I went by the Nunn Design booth yesterday. I ordered some new bird charms and heart charms. I got them in silver, gold and copper finishes.

One intersting thing I ran across today - Ice Resin. This is a resin that is jewelry grade, crystal clear, NON-TOXIC and takes about 24 hours to set up. I have resin, but it's like hazardous to use. You could use this stuff in the pendant trays. It looked really nice. The booth personnel told me it always works if you follow the directions. The mistakes that people make include measuring incorrectly and stirring for too short a time. If you're interested in checking this out - http://www.iceresin.com/ One other thing, they showed paper that they coated with this resin. It was cool. It kind of darkened the paper and of course made it really strong. They said you could coat one side of the paper, put this on wax paper and then coat the other side. The side that dries on the wax paper is a matte finish and the other side is a glossy finish. They made jewelry pieces with the paper. It's hard to describe, but there is a tutorial at the Ice Resin website.

I am going home tomorrow. I have a ton of stuff to pack. I hope I can get it all in my suitcases. I think I'll be able to get it all in my suitcases, but the problem will be lifting the suitcases. All of the catalogs and goodies from the classes are heavy.

I didn't take as many photos of the classes today. This house themed project was the second class. This one was sponsored by My Little Shoebox. They have scrapbook papers. They aren't exactly my style, but they are fun. I photographed the cover and a couple of the pages.

This was my first class. I was late as I got held up in one of the booths while I was ordering. This one was called Amazing Stamped Mini Book. I'm not sure how amazing the project was, but I got a ton of cool stuff from this class.

This is a Hampton Arts clear stamp that I really liked.

This is a snapshot of all of the loot that we got from this class. I think there were 4 stamp sets, 5 ink pads, 2 WM stamps, embossing powder and 2 of the Smooch inks. I'd never used the Smooch inks. We painted them on the stamps and stamped with them. They're kinda cool, but I don't know if I'd use them enough to buy any.

Wrapping up - I also went to my Victorian scrap wholesaler. I usually have to get these shipped from Germany. One of the former employees of the company started a wholesale distributor business here in the US. So now I can buy the Victorian scraps here in the US and I can order lesser quantities and have a bigger variety. Plus if I run out of something, I can get it in stock again in a few days. I was very happy to learn this. I've ordered about 25 new Victorian scraps. I'm not sure when they will be in.

Today was a long day. The show started at 10am and my last class finished at 8pm. Tomorrow I have a jewelry soldering class from 7-9am. I'll go to the show until my class at 4pm. My class at 4pm is one using the Glimmer Mist. I haven't used this stuff before, so I'd like to learn more about it.

One thing I forgot about Maya Road. They have a new product called "Maya Resist." It's like a liquid mask. I ordered in a few of these.

Sunday, January 24, 2010

I decided that I wasn't going to buy a bunch of stuff at Seven Gypsies, because by this time, I'd already spent a lot of my show budget. When I got to the booth, that decision went out the window. This is the Receipt Holder. I hoped it was ATC size, but it's not. It's 4 x 6 or so. Notice what's in the holder - the mini notebooks - Petit Carnet. They are about 3.5 x 5.5 inches, well constructed with pockets in the inside covers and 60 blank ivory pages. When I saw these, the first thing I thought was how cool these would be to alter. There are two more styles that aren't shown here. These are on order. I ordered in the 6 x 6 or 8 x 8 paper packs of the new Venice and Avignon collections. Here's the Avignon paper pack

Here's the Avignon 97% complete tags. These tags are MUCH smaller than the regular size Seven Gypsies tags. I also ordered the matching stamp sets and paper tape sets. The great thing about Seven Gypsies is that they have clearance stuff at ridiculously low prices. I cleaned up! I got the ATC tins, naked pockets, stamp sets, photo turns, gaffer tape, acrylic blocks, and more on clearance. You'll the like prices! I also ordered in a few of the Printer's Trays (ATC size trays) in black and the new white.

I went to Maya Road and ordred some cool stuff there before I went to Crafty Secrets. Unfortunately, my photos at Maya Road didn't turn out so great. I ordred some stamps, chipboard sets. chipboard books and etc. Back to Crafty Secrets. This is one of their new clear stamp sets that I ordered. It's an office-themed set.

They have best card samples at the Crafty Secrets booth. I have to do skinny book page with a mermaid theme and I'm sure that I'll be able to do something with these stamps for the page.

Here are the mermaid stamps.

Alice in Wonderland! Here's a sample card from the new Alice clear stamp set.

Here's the Alice set of stamps. I love them!

This is the new Altered Fairy creative scraps. I got a deal on these! There are crowns, party hats, wings, kids, birds and all sorts of fun do dads on this creative scraps set.

Here's the other side. I ordered in several other stamp sets - a retro coffee set, a set of silly kitties, an "altered art" set that I ordered last year and something else. The "Craft Supershow" was held right before the CHA show. I ordered directly with the owner. She said that she had extras of some of some of the items left over from the Supershow, so I'm brining several stamps and the Altered Fairy Creative Scraps home with me. They will be available next week.

The second place I went was the Advantus booth to order the Tim Holtz Ideaology stuff. I got all the new Ideaology stuff, some of this is pictured above with a sideways photo. I also ordered in the new Tim Holtz papers.

Here's more of the Ideaology.

This is tissue paper tape. The Advantus booth person told me that it is very transparent and fun to layer. I ordered in all 4 of these tape sets.

Another sideways photo. My blogging skills aren't the best. This is Tim's new how-to book. The first 100 people to order got one of these for free and I got one! Woo hoo! I've browsed through it. It shows tons of Tim's techniques and gives you ideas for his stuff. I ordered in a few of these too.

Hi again! If you compare this to yesterday's photo of the main hallway at the convention center, you can see a big difference. They had a little opening ceremony thing and read a letter from the governor of California - Ah-nuld!

The first place I went was Stamper's Anonymous. I took a few photos of some of the samples. This is a sample from one of the new Tim Holtz sets.

Another sample from one of the Tim Holtz sets.

Yet another sample from one of the Tim Holtz sets! I orderd in all of the new Tim Holtz stamp sets except for the alphabet.

I saw this and I love this stamp. Think of the possibilities for Halloween! This is a Michael DeMeng stamp from Stamper's Anonymous. I ordered in this one and one that is a very grungy cabinet card photo like stamp. These are wood-mounted stamps. I ordered one for myself!

Have you heard of the Studio 490 stamps? I'd seen them, but never paid too much attention. I ordered some.

This one has an old bottle and old label.

I like stamps like this - with the woman's face. The Studio 490 stamps are red rubber on vinyl cling.

Here's a sample using one of the Studio 490 stamps.

I'm going to do several posts and they will end up backwards. I guess I should do the last post first, but it's been a long day! Does this even make any sense????

Saturday, January 23, 2010

Hi everyone! I'm here in Anaheim, CA for the CHA 2010 Winter show. The show starts tomorrow. Today was an "education" day.

This is a shot of the hallway in the convention center. It's not busy today. Wait until tomorrow. This will look completely different!

Here's a photo of the hallway where my class was held today. Room 213A. Lucky number 13! My class today was with Hero Arts.

These are the projects we were supposed to make. You know how it goes at these things. You never have time to finish everything. What you do finish usually isn't so great as you're hurrying trying to get it done. We had to share supplies, so that slowed things down too. Honestly, I cannot stamp in classes. I don't what my deal is, but my stamping in classes is horrible.

Here's the package of stuff that was waiting for us. These classes are always great. They cost $25 and you always walk away with lots of stuff for your $25. Sometimes I win door prizes in the classes, but not this time. :(

One thing about this class that was different. Hero Arts is using a LOT of the Ranger/Tim Holtz stuff and selling these items too. They are selling the new Distress Inks pads, Diamond Glaze, the Mini Misters and I don't know what all else.

Here's the first card we did. The person next to me got this dot stamp in her kit. We had to share it. She liked the WM big stamp that was in my class kit, so we traded! A win-win situation. We put Diamond Glaze on the donut.

For this one, the big flower was already stamped and embossed on watercolor paper. (See the Dots stamp again?) We colored it with distress inks. Then we sprayed it with a mini mister with perfect pearls and water. The distress inks were supposed to run together, but of course, mine did NOT! I didn't feel bad as the person next to me, hers looked just like mine.

In the sample, the donut didn't look this big. When I was trying to put this all together like the sample, I said something like "This donut is freaking huge!" And of course the instructors heard me and laughed. It really is too big for the coffee cups.

Here's the clear stamps that I got. I think they made special kits for us with stamps from several different sets. I like this set better than the one that had the coffee cups and donuts.

A boring photo, but here's the dot stamps. It's mounted on vinyl cling and is big enough for a greeting card.

In the class kit, I got a Scattered Straw Distess Ink Pad, 3 acrylic blocks (now I can only find two of them here at the hotel), a tape runner and a black Hero Arts stamp pad.

We had like 10 minutes to do this bracelet. Right! I used the new Barn Red Distress Ink - smooshed it around some. They had this gold glitter spray stuff, so that went on next. I used one of the clear stamps with black ink. I wanted to color in parts of the stamped parts, but alas, the class was over. I have one card to finish up too.

I enjoyed the class. The show starts in earnest tomorrow. I have two classes. The first is the "Amazing Stamped Mini Book" and I have no clue who is putting this on. I can't remember and it's not on my ticket. The second is the "Latest and Greatest of My Little Shoebox," I also have no clue what we'll be doing in this class, but I can always learn something and the MLS products are cool.

I can't wait for the show tomorrow. It's always so much fun to see what's new and place orders. The hard thing is not being able to order everything I'd like to order.

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